


Cute in a Collar

by Aryashi



Category: The Magnus Archives (Podcast)
Genre: A Leitner Made Them Do It (The Magnus Archives), A brief cameo by Tim and Sasha, Catboy Jon (In Spirit), Collars, Dubcon Cuddling, M/M, Petplay
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-13
Updated: 2021-03-13
Packaged: 2021-03-20 18:48:47
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,540
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/30009351
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Aryashi/pseuds/Aryashi
Summary: Martin was dreaming. That was the only possible explanation. He was having a weird,weirddream. He’d be embarrassed in the morning, and have to drag his sheets down to the laundromat so they wouldn’t be gross when he got home at night. Jon never noticed when Martin looked at his nose instead of his eyes anyway. As soon as he woke up everything would be fine. Just another completely normal day in the Archives with his unfairly hot boss.Jon hummed into Martin’s neck, rubbing his cheek into his shoulder. The small bell on Jon’s collar jingled, and he settled into Martin’s lap like he was going to nap right there.
Relationships: Martin Blackwood/Jonathan "Jon" Sims | The Archivist
Comments: 13
Kudos: 108





	Cute in a Collar

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Prim_the_Amazing](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Prim_the_Amazing/gifts).



Martin was dreaming. That was the only possible explanation. He was having a weird, _weird_ dream. He’d be embarrassed in the morning, and have to drag his sheets down to the laundromat so they wouldn’t be gross when he got home at night. Jon never noticed when Martin looked at his forehead instead of his eyes anyway. As soon as he woke up everything would be fine. Just another completely normal day in the Archives with his unfairly hot boss.

Jon hummed into Martin’s neck, rubbing his cheek into his shoulder. The small bell on Jon’s collar jingled, and he settled into Martin’s lap like he was going to nap right there. Jon wasn’t straddling him. Honestly Martin might have preferred that, because then he could’ve convinced himself it was some kind of sex hallucination brought on by chronic anxiety.

But no, Jon was just. Sat there. Occasionally shifting, leaning into Martin, arms resting against his chest and hands relaxed and open. His eyes were closed, and he looked more at ease than Martin had ever imagined possible. A significant part of Martin wanted to let Jon sleep in peace, damn his own inconvenience.

Jon moved his leg, and that happened to rub Martin’s absolutely raging erection. The rest of Martin screamed in absolute mortification and confusion, and it quickly overpowered everything else.

“J-Jon?”

Jon stirred slightly.

“Jon?”

“Mm.” Jon leaned more into Martin’s chest, curling up smaller.

“Jon, can you look at me? A-are you alright?”

He blinked slowly and then frowned. Jon turned to look him in the eyes, and Martin’s met with a very familiar expression. Jon wore it whenever Martin brought him tea during some task or other, interrupting him and breaking his concentration. He halfway expected to be given a lecture about bothering people while they’re in the middle of something.

Jon opened his mouth, and said “Meow.”

Or, that wasn’t quite right. That was definitely the word, but Jon didn’t say it like he was saying a word. He said meow like he was _meowing,_ the best imitation of a cat he could muster.

Martin’s first thought was _My boss is having a psychotic breakdown in my lap._ The practical part of his brain reached towards his phone to call… someone. 999? What would he even say? “Yes, hello operator? My unfairly attractive employer is in my lap and thinks he’s a cat?”

He was yanked out of this train of thought when Jon curled back up into his chest, eyes closed and without a care in the world. Martin could feel his breathing slowing down; Jon was already almost asleep again.

But the new position gave Martin a good look at the back of Jon’s neck. The collar was a soft pastel pink with a silver clasp to match the silver bell. The colors clashed violently with the bright red tag, stamped with clear black letters. It took Martin a second to recognize it.

Artefact Storage. That was an Artefact Storage tag.

A cold stone of dread dropped into Martin’s stomach. Everyone in the Institute knew to avoid Artefact Storage, and to especially avoid anything marked with that tag. They were dangerous, unpredictable, and one was _wrapped around Jon’s neck._

Martin reached up to unclasp the collar and get it as far away from Jon as quickly as possible. Right as his fingers made contact, Jon’s eyes snapped open and he jerked away from Martin’s grasp. Then Jon _hissed_ at him. Open mouth, with all his teeth showing.

“Jon, I have to get that off you, it isn’t safe--” Martin said, reaching out again. Martin felt Jon’s legs tense up, eyes following Martin’s motion, and he paused.

When cats got scared, they bolted. If Jon ran away from him, he could escape upstairs, or into the stacks. He was small enough to hide, and even if he wasn’t fast he was almost certainly faster than Martin. If he lost Jon, there would be no telling how long it would take to find him again. That entire time, Jon would be wearing the collar with an Artefact Storage tag.

“Sorry, sorry,” Martin said, clearly moving his hand away from Jon and holding it up for inspection. “See? No touching.”

Jon observed the motion. He blinked slowly. Martin expected him to curl back up into his chest, but instead, Jon leaned forward and inspected Martin’s hand. He sniffed it cautiously, and then pressed his whole head into Martin’s fingers.

Martin went shock still. Jon rubbed his hair against Martin’s hand, meowing again. The longer Martin sat there doing nothing, the more noises Jon made and the more insistent he got. Eventually Jon backed up a bit, looked Martin in the eyes, and said “Meow!” As though that was an especially convincing argument in favor of whatever Jon wanted.

“Okaaay…” Martin said. “You… think you are a cat. Alright. So as a cat, you want to uh-” Martin shifted again, trying and failing to adjust his pants and Jon. “Sit in my lap and…”

Jon blinked slowly at him.

“... No.”

“Meow,” Jon said, forcing his head into Martin’s hand again.

“Why is this happening to _me?”_ Martin mumbled to himself. Then he scratched Jon’s hair.

The effect was instantaneous. Jon’s eyes rolled back into his head, and a smile Martin had never seen before rose to his features. Jon’s muscles lost all their tension all at once, and he collapsed into Martin’s chest. A moment or two of wiggling into place, and he sighed in bone deep satisfaction. Martin mechanically scratched his head through the entire process. Jon made no move to shake him off, so he kept doing it. The silver bell clinked against one of Martin’s shirt buttons.

“Alright. You want scritches, Jon? Sure. All the scritches you need!” Martin said. It was only a little hysterical, which he considered an accomplishment. He made good on his word and moved his fingers through Jon’s hair, lightly scratching him all over. Jon somehow managed to relax more, and Martin listened to Jon’s breathing as carefully as he could.

Jon made… a noise. Martin didn’t understand it at first. He was almost humming? But not any sort of tune. A sustained note, only stopped when Jon had to inhale. It picked up again, and it got louder when Martin scratched certain spots. Maybe he was trying to communicate somehow?

“Can you… understand me?”

The humming didn’t even pause.

“Jon?”

Nothing for a moment, just Jon shifting around in Martin’s lap. Then, “Meow?”

Martin didn’t actually know that much about cats, but he remembered hearing somewhere that meowing was a noise cats made exclusively for humans. Hell, he might have even heard that from Jon. Most of Martin’s random trivia knowledge could be traced back to some rambling lecture Jon had gotten into within Martin’s earshot. If it was Jon who told him that, that meant that Jon was only making that noise to communicate with Martin. What was Jon responding to? What had Martin said?

“... Jon?”

“Meow.”

“Jon.”

“Meow.”

“You’re only responding to your name.”

Silence. Jon blinked at Martin, slowly.

“Alright. Okay. That works. Back to plan A then.” Martin scratched Jon behind his right ear, and Jon leaned into the motion as hard as he could. That weird humming started up again. Wait. Not weird humming. Or, yes, weird humming, but-- Jon was purring. Jon was _purring,_ in Martin’s _lap,_ utterly melting under _his_ touch _._

Martin’s erection hadn’t gone away or anything, during all this, but suddenly it was all he could think about. The way Jon was utterly boneless and trusting, how well he fit in Martin’s lap, legs and arms curled up close like this was the safest and most comfortable spot in the world. Martin suddenly couldn’t tear his eyes away from Jon’s throat, the curve of his collar bone just barely visible underneath his button up. And… the button up was open. That was new. Jon always wore it buttoned either all the way up or with only one button undone. It made him look so distant and distinguished. But now that distance was gone, and Jon’s top _four_ buttons were open. It practically made him look debauched. The effect was only enhanced by the silver bell resting on his newly exposed skin.

Wait. The collar. The evil, almost certainly cursed collar. Martin shouldn’t be getting distracted. He needed to get that collar off of Jon.

Martin began to let his hands wander. First over Jon’s head, and the other supporting his back. He didn’t want to move too quickly, risk scaring Jon off. Jon shifted slightly, curling up and cuddling closer. The heel of his shoe started to dig into Martin’s thigh, but he appreciated the grounding distraction. If he focused on that bit of discomfort, he could almost ignore how Jon was sitting in his lap, leaning against his chest, humming softly. Just as that humming began to taper off and Martin thought he could risk moving a hand towards the collar, Jon shifted again.

Martin went still, bit the inside of his cheek. He couldn’t make any noise or move too much, no matter _what._ Even if Jon was somehow, still, after all this time, finding new ways to shift around in his lap. Martin tasted blood and he stopped biting, but without that all he could think about how close he was to-- to the _unthinkable._

 _There’s a cat in your lap._ Martin thought desperately. _A cat! Nothing at all sexy about a cat. A big, furry, sleepy cat. You’re going to pet him, listen to him purr, let him relax and go all boneless and trusting..._

Martin unfocused his eyes. Gingerly started petting Jon’s head. Smooth strokes this time, soothing instead of scratching. Jon sighed in appreciation, deep and slow breaths ghosting over Martin’s chest. He started stroking down Jon’s back. Long ones, and with each one he started oh so slightly closer to Jon’s neck.

His finger brushed the buckle. Jon grumbled, but didn’t respond. Martin started the next stroke on the back of Jon’s head, and traveled the whole length of his spine. No reaction.

 _One test left._ Martin let his fingers rest on the collar. Jon didn’t react at all, even after a minute of counted seconds. Slowly, slowly, Martin brought his other hand up, and closed his fingers around the buckle. What now? Should he try to ease it off slowly, avoid startling him? Martin looked down at Jon’s face, silently debating what to do.

In that moment, as if somehow sensing that Martin was looking at him, Jon’s eyes snapped open and the choice was made for him. Martin grabbed the strap as best he could, flicked the buckle open, and yanked the collar off of Jon’s neck in as close to one motion as he could get.

 _“MEO-ARTIN!_ What on _earth_ are you doi--?!”

It was a terrible tableau. Jon was sitting in Martin’s (his employee’s) lap with his shirt halfway unbuttoned. In one hand Martin held Jon’s shoulder; in the other he held a pink collar with a silver bell and an Artefact Storage tag on it. Worst of all, Martin was absolutely certain Jon could feel the hardness in Martin’s trousers rubbing against his thigh. 

So of course that was when they heard the telltale sounds of Tim and Sasha coming back downstairs after having lunch together.

“Hope we didn’t keep you alone down here too long Mar--” Tim said, clearing the ceiling and getting line of sight first. Much like Martin and Jon, he took one look at the scene in front of him and froze rock solid.

Martin was very well acquainted with silence. If he had to pick a specific area of focus, he would say that he had the most experience with terrible silence. The silence of an angry parent, an unimpressed interviewer, an empty flat. Martin knew them all like the back of his hand. They were as familiar as he imagined siblings would be, unfortunate yet constant companions.

This silence, hanging over the Archives, wasn’t terrible. It was _beyond_ terrible. Martin didn’t even have a word for how bad this was, though maybe someone who went to Uni could have supplied it. Already it was excruciatingly long, dragging itself bodily over the seconds. Any moment now it would break, and while Martin sat there gobsmacked, Jon would take control and begin berating him in front of God and everyone. Or worse, he would have to try to _explain_ how they got there.

As Martin struggled to string a sentence together in his mind, Sasha looked past Tim’s still frozen back, and said “Is that from Artefact storage?”

The collar made a slight jingling noise as Martin pulled it closer. “U-uh, yeah! At least I-I think so? It um, had some effects, and--”

_SMACK!_

Abruptly, the collar slammed into the floor, bell clanging with an ugly sound. It took Martin another second to put together that Jon had literally knocked it out of Martin’s hands.

Wait. Hands, plural?

“You…” Jon swallowed, and visibly composed himself. “You were starting to put it on.”

“O-oh. Oooooh.” Martin felt queasy. “Thanks.”

Jon didn’t reply. Instead, he very carefully got off of Martin’s lap, trying not to shift the wheelie chair around too much as he did.

“Sasha? Could you go up to Artefact storage and request a retrieval?”

She looked over the both of them. Martin could see gears turning in her mind, but as always he couldn’t get any sense of her actual thoughts. At least Tim had the decency to be obviously shocked. It was the longest Martin had ever seen him speechless.

“Sure thing. C’mon Tim, if we’re going to get them to do anything quickly I need you to work your wiles.”

Tim shook himself out of his stupor. Sort of. He still seemed a bit dazed. “You worked there for months,” he said. “Whad’ya need me for?”

Sasha was already walking away. “Diane is very protective of the good tongs.”

With that last enigmatic comment, Sasha and Tim vanished up the stairs. Leaving Jon and Martin. Alone. Jon coughed awkwardly into his fist, and Martin wheeled the chair back under his desk. Even though they both knew what he was trying to hide. Because Jon had, just two minutes ago, been sitting on it.

For another long moment neither of them moved. Martin found himself incapable of even looking in Jon’s direction. Maybe if he started vaguely clicking at his computer, would Jon go away and pretend none of this even happened?

Jon didn’t do that. Instead, he coughed again. Martin turned and locked eyes with Jon’s forehead.

“... Thank you,” Jon said stiffly. “F-for your assistance.”

“T-that’s my job!” Martin said, like a complete moron. “Archival Assistant.”

“Right. Yes. Anyway. We’d-- we had better get back to work.”

Before Martin could stumble out another variation of ‘yes’ or ‘right’, Jon turned on his heel and retreated back to his office at the fastest speed he could respectably manage. The door shut behind him firmly, not quite a slam but certainly loud in the quiet Archives.

Martin counted twenty seconds, and then fled to the (thank _christ)_ one stall Archives bathroom.

**Author's Note:**

> Jon... deserves pets....... sorry Martin. Or, you're welcome? Either/Or.


End file.
